


Be a Little More Selfish

by TheFanficMaster



Category: Fruits Basket (Anime 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anxiety Attacks, F/M, Mutual Pining, Panic Attacks, Pining, Retelling of Canon but with Yukiru ending, Suicidal Thoughts, Yukiru - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-17 17:16:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28603554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFanficMaster/pseuds/TheFanficMaster
Summary: Yuki recognizes his feelings, but knows that Kyo is so far ahead of him when it comes to expressing himself. But what if Yuki learned something from Kyo too, something that pushed him to take that step forward and be by her side like he wants to?A retelling of Fruits Basket canon, starting from the True Form arc. Based on the 2019 anime adaption.
Relationships: Honda Tohru/Sohma Yuki
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> So, I know that I have other stories I need to finish. But I've been tiptoeing around this idea for a while now and I think I wanna write it. No one else is going to do it for me and this is the type of Yukiru fic I wanna see. One that respects Kyoru, doesn't trash on it, but at the same time doesn't end up Kyoru, you know? Kyo was essential to Tohru's character development, I just wanted her to romantically end up with Yuki.
> 
> Because of this change however, I am going to have to make some changes to things down the line. This will start with retellings of episodes and will divert off that train as it goes along. This is probably going to be a long story and I will do my best (I cannot promise due to my disabilities) to update it regularly. Chapters will not be as short as the prologue, I promise. Work may have smutty things down the line, but I am not sure about that yet. We'll see how things develop. I have no outline, writing this as the waves take me.
> 
> No hate will be accepted!

The moment he realized—as he watched her run after Kyo that rainy night—that he saw her as a woman...the breath had left his lungs in a harsh, jarring movement. It left him staring into the darkness of his room, gasping for air as it was mercilessly squeezed from his lungs by the pounding of his own erratic heartbeat.

_Sohma-kun!_

He closed his eyes. This was doomed, wasn’t it? Everyone could see it. Kyo was changing her for the better, getting her to realize things about herself—about her life—that she previously wouldn’t admit.

And Yuki?

He was still here, putting that distance between them because he was absolutely terrified of her.

It wasn’t a normal, rational fear—like he feared Akito’s wrath, how he tensed whenever Akito was in the immediate vicinity, expecting a blow or harsh words that would take the hope right out of his heart. No, it was….somehow...a more painful fear. He knew how to deal with the fear of hurt, the fear of isolation...even if sometimes his body couldn’t take it anymore and his mind shut down from the complexity of the trauma.

But when he saw Tohru Honda smiling at him, he knew instantly that if he let her in, he was going to end up not being able to fight it.

Just like Kyo.

And Kyo was going to win. There was no contest. Kyo had called her by her name from the start, had established that closeness between them almost immediately.

Yuki was still calling her Honda-san.

Kyo had no idea just how much he had already beaten Yuki—perhaps physically, he could not, not with the fist, but in matters of the heart—his progress was moving so fast that Yuki couldn’t keep up.

And it terrified him.

Voices lingered in his mind.

_If you don’t act, you’re going to lose her._

_If you don’t act, you’re going to end up at square one. Alone._

_Do you want that?_

He slid down the wall, resting his head against the windowpane and fighting the tears in his eyes. Slowly, he wrapped his arms around his knees and his head moved down to rest on them, so he was staring at the fabric of his pants with terrified, tear filled eyes.

_No, I don’t want that._

And that...is how everything began to change.


	2. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yuki has some things to say to Tohru.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, I diverted away from canon to create my own. Sorry it took so long to update, I have high depression and anxiety and PTSD, along with some physical disabilities, so sometimes it's harder to update than I want it to be, but I love writing. I was both encouraged and discouraged by the messages I received on this story--and all I have to say is that I will do my best to write to my capabilities how I feel this pairing should be written. But that being said, I am not writing to meet anyone's expectations, I am writing it for myself. So if I end up disappointing you, I will not be heartbroken.
> 
> But anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter and take care everyone!

The next morning was more awkward than Yuki wanted it to be. None of them had wanted to acknowledge the elephant in the room the night before, with the exception of treating Tohru’s wounds and putting Kyo to bed. Even as Shigure dabbed disinfectant on Tohru’s arm, she was looking upstairs toward the room where she knew Kazuma was carrying Kyo—still in his cat form and asleep from exhaustion and the pain of transforming into that horrid form—to his room.

She was still worried about him, even after he hurt her that bad. Yuki was angry, angry at Kyo for hurting her, but also angry at himself.

Angry because he had done nothing. Despite the realization that he had come to last night, he had sat there and worked through his own emotions instead of worrying about hers.

And so he had taken his anger out on Kyo, once again.

_Me too. I’ll hate you even after I die._

And as always, he wondered why people were so obsessed with his persona that they couldn’t see through to the real him. He was far from nice, far from Princely. He was...such an unruly, nasty person deep down inside.

Just like...Akito.

He walked to school alone that morning earlier than the others. He needed some privacy, some time to think. His heart was full of shadows and he didn’t quite know how to handle it. Was he really the kind of person to take his anger out on others, or did that just apply to Akito?

He needed to change, not just for her, because of her, but for himself...right?

His eyes were still overcast later on, as he looked out over the school grounds from his vantage point on the roof. Distance—he needed the distance, needed to look out over all these people and remind himself that if he wanted to belong among them then he had to change.

It was as much self-harm as it was hope, the reminder that he wasn’t anywhere near close to where he needed to be. His eyes were staring into the distance—his gaze far far away from everyone and everything, when he heard Haru’s voice from behind him.

“...You okay?” Haru asks, coming to stand beside him, and Yuki is as much confused by his own comfort in the other’s presence as he is upset by it. Haru had always come to his aide, even when Yuki had been less than thankful...and if he was going to grow past it, he needed to say something.

“...I’m sorry...for disregarding your feelings for me.”

Haru’s eyes went wide with shock and Yuki held his breath, unconsciously terrified of being hit even though he knew—always knew—that he was safe with Haru...he was one of the only safe places he had and yet…

“That’s all right.” Haru responded and Yuki felt his knees grow weak, the tension that had been keeping him standing dissolving right out of them. How was he supposed to handle the rest of the day wearing his mask if his body wouldn’t cooperate with him?

He was so terribly weak, even now. Surely if Kyo had appeared this instant demanding a fight, he would fall to his fist...but he knew that Kyo wasn’t that type of person. He wouldn’t attack Yuki while his guard was down.

Kyo was much more honorable than him in so many ways. Kyo was moving forward. Yuki needed to do the same.

“Are you sure that’s all that’s bothering you?” Haru gently pressed, reaching out and resting a hand on his shoulder, the other stuffed into his pants pocket. Yuki shook his head—a part of him wanted to tell Haru everything, unload his burden on him, because he knew that Haru would take it and smile still, but that would be...wrong...wouldn’t it?

He was so confused. He didn’t know how to handle any of this.

And then Haru opened his mouth again, “Honda-san was worried about you. You didn’t notice, did you?”

And Yuki could have sworn his heart stopped in that moment. _Honda-san…_

“...No…” He sighed, both with frustration at himself and exasperation. Of course she was worried about him, when she should be more worried about herself, about her injuries, about how this was going to affect her life going forward living with the Sohmas. But that was just the kind of person that she was...and it was why he’d become so smitten with her in the first place. That kindness was something he had never seen before, not in this dark world he was stuck in. She was the light in the dark, cutting through his pain and self-hatred. He wanted to cling to that light and absorb it just as much as he wanted to protect it.

Pathetic.

\------

The day wore on him more than he wanted to admit and he was exhausted by the time school’s ending began to sound from the bells. He stood and gathered his things with a fake smile, ignoring the mutterings of girls who didn’t know him, not really, and left the classroom.

He needed to find her.

It didn’t take long really, because she was looking for him too. However, it seemed he saw her first, as she was climbing the stairs to the roof.

“Honda-san.”

She twisted at the top of the stairs, eyes alit with a spark at the sight of him, and opened her mouth to speak, “Sohma-kun--”

Yuki interrupted her, something that he would later be upset at himself for doing, but he needed to get this out while he had the courage. “I want to get better. I want to be a man who can express his feelings without being overcome by them, you understand?”

She stared at him without speaking, seeming to know that he needed her silence in this moment to navigate it and he slowly made his way up the stairs toward her. He thought about last night, how his heart had hammered in his chest, how the pain had spread from the overworked muscle to his limbs all the way down to his fingertips. He thought about that one day, where Akito had shown up at school, how he had been so, so weak under God’s touch that he had nearly fallen...and of course, his light in the dark had come to smile at him and bring him to a lighter place when his knees had gone weak with fear and panic—overwhelmed by the darkness in the world.

He thought about how he used to be before he met her, how he had stopped speaking for a while because it was useless, so useless, to speak when no one could hear his screaming--

“Sorry for worrying you, Honda-san,” He began, a soft smile on his lips that still felt fabricated somehow, even when staring at her, because he had never learned how to smile and mean it. “I’m still not very cool and there are still a lot of things I cannot tell you--” Because he didn’t know how, no matter how his heart was screaming-- “But I hope little by little, I’ll gain the courage to tell you.”

She paused, taking in his words and then…

“Okay.”

She was smiling at him and warmth spread from his chest through his limbs at the sight and it...it gave him courage, her easy acceptance, how she always took the broken pieces of him and held them close like they were something to be cherished as is instead of something to be put back together.

He reached her on the steps and turned to smile at her again. “I want to create a lot of memories with you.”

_I want to fill my heart with you and only you._

She blinked, stunned, and he tilted his head. “You don’t want to?”

“N-No, that’s not--”

“If you don’t,” His smile grew and he reached out to grab a lock of her hair in his fingers, pressing it to his lips. “I’ll just snatch you away, so be ready.”

And of course there was the terrifying moment where he thought he’d messed up when she hit her head on the railing, but then she was being her cute self, trying to navigate the way he’d flustered her, and he couldn’t help but laugh—the sound coming forth freely from his heart like it had always belonged there.

He missed her pleased smile.

“...Lets go, Honda-san.”

“Okay.”


End file.
